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Valentine’s Day: The Secret to a Happy Marriage

Found myself sitting in a chair next to a framed picture from our wedding day. It was only 22 years ago, but I almost didn’t recognize those people who found one another after 20 years of kissing toads. They looked so young, vibrant, healthy, energetic, and life was full of promise.

There were no lines on their faces, no fat around the middles, plenty of hair on their heads, and they could do anything they set their minds to. They knew all the answers, and they were in love without knowing what that meant.

They didn’t know that love changes with each season. They didn’t know that love grows like an old oak tree. It weathers storms, sun, disease, earthquakes, rain, and snow. It sometimes rages like a fire and then calms down like a slow-moving brook on a hot summer day. Love can be like an out-of-balance pendulum or a totally synchronized, smooth running engine.

They also didn’t know that love grows. It can be hard to imagine that the love you feel today can (and should) grow stronger over the years. Like the oak tree, the weathering of storms has actually made the love and marriage stronger.

A friend of mine, John, started me on this thought path when he was answering the proverbial question “what makes your marriage work”. When young people see you’ve been married for a long time and that your marriage seems to work, they want to know the secret, and John was right… every couple has their own secret. A secret that was hewn, shaped, molded, and crafted by the seas of life together.

Happy Valentine’s day and may your seas always be smooth, but when they are not… put on your life preservers.